The More Telling Of Maps
by 221Beatsofmyheart
Summary: AU that takes place a year after Sirius' death. Remus spends a lot of a time in the basement of Lupin cottage which Tonks has moved in to watch over him. It's about Remus after Sirius death, dealing with himself, working towards revelation with the help of a second enchanted map and the ever-growing reminders of a certain dog kind of guy.
1. Chapter 1

This was derogatory. It was. Extensive months of work was laid all around him. If you were to walk in on Remus Lupin at this given moment, you would be inclined to say it was Sirius Black that had created this mess. It was not, however, at least not directly.  
Tonks. Stop it. Stop it please. He could hear plates smashing above his head. Her aim was direct, a couple of them rolling around as if spiralling down a drain above his head.  
This idea had started on the eve of the anniversary of Sirius' death. Now, he was the notorious owner of the marauder's map. Although it had been down to him for the very physics and anatomy of it, it had always been Padfoot's and Prong's legacy. Without them, it had merely been a thing that curled and lifted itself from the table. That was Sirius and James unleashing havoc and mind fuckery on him but the map had manifested into a joint effort, a new person of sorts. At his will, as soon as he entered the basement room, it would flap and soar in greeting.  
When Sirius had died, a great deal had been done to his heart. It was never quite the same. Others who would comment now in reflection on that period of Lupin's life would describe it as generally consisting of screaming. Although most of it was internal and he was a walking shacken, broken-down washing machine of death in a living man, a werewolf's scream is never misheard. Stealth never had been his strong point. Then again, he was now perfecting the art to all but Tonks. The order tended to typecast him as a teacher.  
Of course he never taught them anything, but as comes with the authoritative position, he was treated as if it was alright 'up there', There are some things magic just can't detect. A teacher trait that did contribute, though, was his initiative to understand, to pick apart. Yes, libraries were involved. Many, such as it were. Sirius nor James would have let him a step further into an establishment like that but as completely helpless to stop him as they were now, he had always found a way around their wishes. Especially when they were knocked out after a particularly hard day of traumatising first years and raising indecency among their peers.  
What he had trouble with in the anniversary of Sirius' death was this: why, in the world of earths, in the god bloody name of Merlin was buried in his heart? The answer was simple, any muggle of any counselling kind could detect this in an instant. He'd lost Sirius. But that wasn't the only thing. It was a part of his heart that was nothing to do with the demolished state. That was gone forever but there are parts of the heart less easy to self-destruct. So, from then on the Marauder's map appeared as technology not just limited to paper.  
Remarkably, applied to other hypothetical things, it fit perfectly like a key to a lock. What if, he had thrown his hands up in the air one day and had had waved in the air in Moony-fashion, labels could mark the heart, to pinpoint exactly what condition was clouding it? Initially it had seemed like a revelation, now it was a humongous pain in the ass and unconditional, erratic, ridiculous science and magic combined, two walks of life that should never coincide.  
For tables of all sizes and variation around him, were what had been three years prior boxes of Sirius' belongings located with him now in the cottage which he inhabited. It had taken Tonks an extremely long time and an outrageous amount of uplifting charms and a kick in the right direction to make him leave Grimmwald Place forever. At first she had been more understanding than any woman should have to be, in the very least not someone who carried as much light as her to deal with a man who as far as diagnosis would go he would call himself clinically insane and much too permanently hungover to see life as anything other as completely draining. She'd been his psychiatrist many too many times but then her methods increasingly became violent and eventually he had to take heed. He was no match and it was in his nature to regard peace as the most vital thing. Back when Sirius was around, he was far strong-willed in intellectual combat but now he was a deflated marshmallow more quickly without him bringing it out of him. It came without fight.  
On the boxes was anything from dismantled magical items to dissected thread from his cardigans and discarded daily prophets and occasionally the fair, odd Quibbler lost amongst the stern broad sheets. He liked to call that issue: issue black 22. More closer to him was a long, obscenely placed as if he had just walked in one day and apparated it in in a flurry. In fact, he had. Across it was a massive laminated sheet of parchment which showed in red ink every criss cross, mish mosh of the heart which he had allocated a very specific name to each valve. Tonks was there. Terribly small, I'm afraid, his tired voice had said, very small indeed. The area wrapped around had the appropriate name of 'guilt' and a little above that region span out an area so large he could hardly sketch defence against the dark arts and the rights of werewolves and the order among many other incredibly important things that was the complex matter of three boys, four is himself is to be included, remarkable men he could now say built in a large land encrusting the back of his heart. That was always strange, he would have imagined back in Hogwarts that they would have been at the forefront but it made much more sense now that they had taken a painful place to sit as reminder, whether it was when he was out battling against the harsh cold of Godrics Hollow or simply out for a butterbeer or a firewhisky as was often the case by the time that he got to a pub.  
Harry was a part integrated but rightfully so, an entire part of his own. He often seemed like a tumour of Remus' own demise. It wasn't the boy's fault. He had inherited the love of both James' and Sirius' ruleful, rule-less love among his own for him and there was no one on the right sight of the border between life and death that regarded him higher. At times, the thought of Harry loitering about out there in the cold, godawful world around him was his only smidge of sanity. It would only got harder for him, and Remus was under compulsive suspicion that it kept him up at night that Harry was about to encounter more than what they had already suffered at the hands on and he felt that maybe, no indefinitely, that he was going to be less of a help than what was good for him.  
He touched the areas nearest to him from angle that in gold lettering were named 'mother' and 'father' and the names that spawned restlessly from them. His hand stuttered as he traced them, the names for which the animals and the men whom he had killed in his other form. His heart didn't beat very well down there. He had various heart surgeries performed there, and he had even had to conjure a stitching or two to keep all the blood from spilling out. He had been stood in the same place for a number of hours and the plates had stopped above him and he could hear the faint drone of a shower, each individual tear-drop reminded him of July 1980.  
His figure drowned in shadow, his spine had began to ache uncharacteristically against the stern wall of green wool that covered it. If he had not known better, and was a bit more naive about his condition that he was actually beginning to change. He wasn't, it was as human as a war. His heart lapsed gently and his breath rasped in a faint memory of asthma he used to have before first year in Hogwarts. It had left rather suddenly joining a compartment of a ragged black haired boy, tie askew and wand brandished on the Hogwarts express. He had seemed to pass it on to Peter who suffered with it all the way up to Sirius finally snapped and came up with a spell to remove it.  
It had been a long-time coming. He was shaking so impulsively that it reminded him of the small chunk of chocolate hidden within his pocket that rustled with his bodily pulsations. His facial expression twisted in recognition and he held it, losing himself subconsciously in his faults and taking it out again, acting almost as if he didn't have it, not recognising the substance had melted all over his fingers. He watched the parchment with all of the concentration he had the entire time he had spent in education, and that was all the concentration ever physically possible in the company of rowdy friends. It was sad that he was beating his record now. Any second now. Anyyy second.  
There. That. Then. His head span and he had to steady himself by reaching out an arm to hold himself up, his clean hand almost wounding him in the abdonomen where pain collected. He held it there and he drew inwards in himself with elation at what commenced in front of him. His eyes consumed and reflected the the lights of the golden marks that rioted like swarms of bees in a hive. The real heart which the parchment represented suddenly felt as if was inhabited with such insects. It momentarily made him feel extremely ill. It was not something he had ever spared a thought for, let alone created the notion of. Of course it was just imagery but even so, there was something warm about seeing each individual that he cared for buzzing around his heart like little...God, Sirius would bark with laughter if he ever heard this, but...but angels, in a way, in some sort. He regained his masculine composure, his lips twisting and his teeth brandishing wide, his eyes looking everywhere as if he could see them lift themselves from the parchment and float around him, further animated and twisting and turning around him, touching his facial scars and healing him with warmth.

This was a huge advancement. Although every millionth of a dot didn't have a name, the fact they were there at all was something supernatural, even for a wizard of his level. The world thought it knew magic. Heavens to hell, they did not know a thing. He was so out of his mind to think for a second to close to a minute how a muggle's perception and reaction to an amateur trick of a so-called magician was closer to magic than he had ever come. The shock was something he wasn't used to. He knew all there was to know about spell after potion after spell and there was nothing that he could never anticipate but this was a different matter entirely. It showed that the showmanship of a magic act performed for muggle children - the larger the performance, the brighter the lights, the cheesier the wording, the more elevating and utterly moving it was. He fell backwards onto a box that he knew was behind him, scrabbling for a mug of coffee that he had leant beside it, raising it to his lips, looking as if he had seen far too many ghosts to put a number to and he was being forcefully revoked by joy. "Sirius, even this would stun you out of daily expecidades." he chucked throatily, out of ridicule or pain, he couldn't know.


	2. Chapter 2

Remus always had dark shadows under his eyes. It had almost become his second most idealised feature other than the deep lines in his face. After the commotion of his heart last night, he had spent almost two days under candlelight watching the lighted marks skip and dance underneath his gaze as if he was reading a book for the first time or he was man confronted with fire. He had only almost ten minutes unearthed himself from his confined quarters downstairs. There was a faint detection of something order-like about the condition of the house. That was what happiness could do to him - reduce his vocabulary to that of catering for words he could not find. Passing Tonks in the hallway had been a funny incident in itself - it was not in his nature to laugh, but it was hard to contain himself at the look that she gave him as he came up on the basement ladder looking as if he had just given birth and been born himself, resurrected as Godric Gryffindor and pranced across the hallway when all he was really doing was having a small discussion of a smile to himself. He really wasn't in a place to help it, but he was so clear of immediate angst that Tonks hair turned a soft yellow from a intensely dramatic red as he crossed her. In an unexpected, intimate movement he had kissed her on the cheek, smelling distinctly of sweat and for some reason that would keep bothering Tonks all day, strawberries and cream.

He was now in the raggedy cottage kitchen that he owned and the breeze was coming on from the back door and he treated himself to actual strawberries and cream from the freezer. Heavens knows where that came from, though, he had never bought it. He had not touched the stuff since Sirius had left them - it had been his favourite from an early point - it was, he liked to think, or could never really put his finger on the reason that they had connected - for if it wasn't for the strawberries and cream located on the Gryffindor table slap-bang in front of first-year Remus, lost and simply baffled that Sirius reached for, they might almost never had developed from acquaintances into friends.

The map had brought him into highs he believed he would never feel again in his surely short-lived life and he would angst himself into an early grave. He wasn't quite so sure why he needed it so much - the map, itself. Maybe the reason for his child-like happiness was the result of accomplishing something that was completely aside from the work that he did with the order. He could never complain. In some respects, the duties he had put upon himself were therapeutic and preoccupied his mind for a very long time and continued to be something that saved him to be blunt about it. The world - from Hogsmede to the Ministry to dusty diagon alley revolved around he-who-must-not-be-named-however-will-be-shamed-and-maimed and his life has dilated to nothing else. It was all that lived for. To have something else grace the picture was a breath of fresh air even if now contemplating it - it reminded him of need to delve into it. The map would have to wait but he had life in him now to get by for longer than he had ever hoped of imagining.

He shrugged on a large, heavy suit and he used a blunt knife to shave to his normal standard and his fingers pelted his heart flimsily and left him with an aftermath of it only being combed, not improved. In a mirror he briefly inspected his strained skin, and eyes that were immersed in what could only be described as dirty water. His nose - noticeably large as it was was more a comfort these darkened days rather than a shield to stop anyone from talking to him unnecessarily, as used to come in useful for when he was in company with a particularly riveting book or plummeting himself into some letter or essay of importance. His eyes paused over where his heart was and his brow burrowed. He had never regarded himself as small - in fact he was lanky and inproproportionate and incredibly skilled in getting under one's feet but in regards to his heart he suddenly felt very to the side.

He shined his shoes with a wet cloth and he disposed of it in an unhinged rusty bin he would never fix. He read through the note that had been left for him sealed with string beside the front door. He expected something along the lines of somebody like Alaster or perhaps one of the Weasleys - Mr Moody was even though you wouldn't think it, very eager giving Remus jobs to keep him occupied. Although it was never a conversation they had ever had - it was apparent and very, very welcomed. The Weasley's on the other hand - especially Molly - had other agendas but were also very fortunate in their kindness often inviting him over to dinner - tea- supper - whenever, now please, would you just come, no time is ever out of the question sort of invitations and he got these almost compulsively through owl every other day. He was certain that he would get a few a day but Arthur created diversions for some of the birds.

The note was unusual. From just as kind and remarkable a wizard, but the more timely-considerate. It unnerved Remus how he would get a letter from Dumbledore on the exact days where his mood turned for the better. He was about to open it with a letter-opener the wrong way around when Tonks came out from the sitting room. He hair had returned to a subtle violet and she seemed to be wearing something not only lycra but luminous. Not used to seeing such bright things, even compared to his night-light bees from last night, he blinks three times in a row and stood backwards in order to squint at it. "You look...you look very nice, Nymphadora."

He was expecting her to be scathing, bubbling like an overflowing cauldron underneath her otherwise pleasant lips but she didn't match his expectations, instead making the most of his changed condition, it seemed and avoiding conflict in the sweet manner that he always noted that she had. Ever since she had moved herself into his not-so-secure home, he had not opposed for it long and submitted to her wishes and came to be accepting of her bids and he thoroughly respected her but his nightmarish tendencies.

He gave her a curt nod, and in a diversion he went about what he was doing and took the letter into his bedroom. He joined the clutter and the obvious inspiration of his classroom from his time at Hogwarts that he had not seen for at least two weeks. As anticipated, he saw the personality of the Weasley's ragamuffin owl Pigwidgen holding the weight of a letter twice it's size. He pulled up a stiff wooden chair and sank into it at his ebony desk facing the window. He found himself needing a little boost and he found himself opening Molly's letter first. Since he had neglected her last two, it was not a surprise it seemed to be stuffed larger. A long scroll of parchment fell out and tumbled onto the floor stretching a length all of the way to his bed. He was almost tempted to turn his wand into a tape measure and count exactly how far that woman would go to get his attention. Now slightly more wary and pining for Dumbledore's shorter approach of a letter, he worked his way into the letter he was holding. Although at times it was pressing and it was painful to be sent a flurry of unpuntuated, long-wounded words and overbearing positivity he was extremely considerate of her thoughts, and her feelings and as much as it often didn't seem so, he very much enjoyed being updated on things he treated as trivial. They came very much as an escape and he felt almost as if he was involved more, and he was carefree in the burrow and joining them for Christmas.

The first few paragraphs were aggressive and sharp followed by sickly sweet intrusions like "But don't worry about any of that, Lupin, dear, we know how much you suffer but we do love you dear, please just let us. You know it can be frustrating." It then became more interesting and he followed it like it was a Dickens masterpiece. His eyebrows raised at the usual fluster that Molly was under subject to the twins - apparently they are adamant on setting up a joke shop supplying all kinds of, in Molly's words 'Toys and complete nuisance and tat! Oh why can't they be lawyers, Oh, Remus...' it displeased him to see Molly in such a state, but he approved of the whole thing. They had always reminded him of James and Sirius and for that reason he was a little bias. It surprised him how personal the letters could be as if he was her brother or next of kin - a son, perhaps, he did like that but the details she would distribute were complexion for he was never sure if him being alerted of 'Oh, Arthur's been having bowl problems lately, poor dear...' and 'I swear Bill keeps sneaking off with Fleur...before marriage. Well, I never. I will be making my opinion very known.' was appropriate for his reading. He intook all of the pleasantries and he sorted through the updates of the order in his absence.

'On that note, I'm sure you know, but you missed Harry's birthday...' he lost his vision and he dropped the letter and moved his hand to his head and he rested his elbow on the table. Dear lord, how could he forget an event like that? He made a disappointed sound with himself through his teeth. He had been selfish in blending the days together that he no longer had hold of the date. Sirius would not be happy, James would be furious, they both would. 'Moony, we'd hoped you'd be a better man,' they'd joke, after throttling him with abuse. He couldn't bear thinking of them looking upon him with pity. Even imaging them taking polyjuice potion to look like any other, he would not be able to drown out images like that. They weren't the concerned type, they were prone to leave that all to him but he was sure they would have meetings concerning him, 'the mother hen'. Thinking like this always revoked feelings of a reminiscent and nostalgic kind. It dampened his mood a bit. Poor Harry. He really should be more responsible. He downsized himself enough by not harrowing a more closely entwined relationship with him of an uncle, much alike to the bond he and Sirius had shared. There was a space for him to fill in, yet it was never possible, not with someone quite as unstable as himself. He was severely unreliable to himself let alone a young teenage boy who he'd rather not disappoint with the supposed 'friend' of his father figures.

and ever since he held Harry when Sirius had fallen through the veil, that moment had claimed them and their relationship, and he assumed their relationship was rooted by devastation and he hadn't the heart to bring any more of that into his godson's life.  
He was not, however, impartial to fire communication to cast his apologies Harry's way. He knelt beside the fire place, his hair static and face eroded. He tightened his tie and crooked his neck, appearances were important. He felt he would always be more appealing to Harry as the role of a teacher, the closest he was going to get if he was not his deluded self. His heart lifted as he became a spectator of Harry over the flames. Peeves noticed him first and leant in very close. 'Ahahahahaha, Here is Sir king of the moon, daft as a wooden spoon. Forgot his poor, little Harry's b'day, what would James and Sirius say?'

Reserving into himself slightly, he tightened his shoulders, and his teeth clenched but he kept his expression kindly and welcoming for Harry to come over. "Harry..I am so sorry but you..." he got a closer look of his face. "-already know that, don't you." his lifted his hand absent-mindedly wanting to reach out and swipe the unkempt hair like his father's from his face.  
"Professor-" Remus winced and immediately it was regrettable.  
"You don't need to apologise. I understand." the simple two words and the intense eye contact was, Remus could confirm, of course he did, more than anyone and he never quite acknowledged that or gave him the credit. He could feel the heat of the mark named 'Harry' etching across the paper in movement. His heart a steady companion to the conversation they entered without any of Remus' apprehension that he never went a day without believing there to be. Lifting himself from the flames, he had promised a visit and a late present which would no doubt contain a large dosage of chocolate in a wooden box and an heirloom of Sirius' which he would have to build up the courage to find.

He read Dumbledore's note as he took off his clock and hung it up on the door of his room and he walked into the hallway. He always felt much too big for his place of residence - the werewolf within made it so he had to bend his head when the ceiling lowered in parts. It seemed he had spent longer than he had thought conversing with Harry and the milestone overwhelmed him as he walked through the dark of the cottage. He walked into a room - he wasn't sure which - alarmingly glued to the moon that covered the sky through the panes. He looked up at it, his mouth gaping unattractively and his hands deep in his pockets, his neck craned as he estimated the proximity. He stood there for a good few minutes before he was roused from the unusual beauty to look upon in the ghost of the chains it had bound him by from the pure age of nine. It was a circumstance to behold and he couldn't quite help feeling like Sirius bounding along, in the way he found feminine, in collection of the moonlight, ears pricked and tongue lolling, writhing happily in the lit grass. Sirius had told him repeatedly how the moon was nothing to fear 'It's a part of our Moony, how can that make it any less than good?'

He roused, as a chill had settled through him and he felt Nymphadora's prescience to the left-hand side of him, slightly behind but brave in her advance. She had come to know from observing him that using the silence against him and getting to him before he could blink an eye-lid make it difficult for him to turn her away. Judging by the tilt of her curiosity, her eyes wide as disks he imagined, that she wanted to comfort him and perhaps, oddly, he wouldn't object but he was glad for her distance. She always so patient. His voice was fond as he spoke and her footing let him know it had taken her off guard. "Tonks."  
"Tonks?" she laughed. "It's Tonks now, is it? What's happened to you, Remus-y?"  
"You know I prefer and will continue to keep using Nymphadora."  
She snorted and he only found it partially uncomfortable. "Only you can get away with that."  
"Good Night, Nymphadora." he dove in, gently, his hand on the door before disappearing. And that would be the extent of their contact for probably up to another month.


	3. Chapter 3

Remus sat with the parchment in the basement. He had found that turning on a small light, helped even further and he was partial to a little bit of vinyl music. It took him back to his hay-days. He could almost visualise Sirius trying to turn it off and discovering that Remus was always one step ahead of him and Sirius would lie on the floor, sweating and sulking from the effort. Remus worked, individual sparks flouncing from the tip of his wand. He would sometimes stand and walk around, flicking his wand with his wrist and perfecting his calculations. One of the lights on the page was very persistent. It was the cause of many collisions with the lights that crooned beside it. He could almost detect that this mark was important in some way through its ability to exterminate opposition.

When he was younger and in the company of boys who did everything they could do to stop him reflecting and thinking, he was just as deep and philosophical now as he had been back then and the revelation of the skittering dot opened the door to many thoughts that he had never gone into with depth. He thought about the times in his life where a certain dot could have been a problem when meeting new people and he could configure it was mostly down to insecurities. It was an infuriating conclusion to keep coming to explanations that were emotion-based and derived from self-perception because the light was neither of these things. Supposedly, he had designed the map to show only people, the purpose was to note the specific man and woman and child and where they dwelled inside him so it must be one.

He had enjoyed getting to know every light personally. He had a sneaking feeling of dread that it was the most he had ever interacted with people in his whole life, in one day and gradually characteristics were grown to each one. He catalogued each, keeping a tab on every individual and it was his favourite past time coming down every down and being able to detect which was which and learning something new about one or two. Truth to be told, it was probably down to the challenge of one day being able to label them with the exact person they actually are or were. No riddle in a newspaper or a NEWT test had ever given such an invigorating purpose and crude game.  
Something unheard of started to happen that day. Two of the marks seemed to circle each other menacingly. One he referred to as 'the one' and the other 'the one which fights its corner'. Both had showed signs of boisterous activity but he hadn't seen anything like it.  
He felt like a frog had come clean from a potion and taken himself into his throat and he scolded them.

Two months of jubious merry-making which Remus was not an active part of, the study of his heart unearthed quite the interesting discoveries. He had never once deemed it possible but the basement had grown in mess count and he was becoming decreasingly less surprised if tentacles would spring from the mountains of leather hardbacks, snow covered with ambiguous, wretched notes only applicable and dissectable by himself.

He was closely following the pattern of the rampant mark, seeming to revel in his attention and come out of itself, continuously setting its territory it did not ask for and ruled his heart by storm. It was a funny sensation. He sat back. Being aware that there was something dominating over his heart in such an absurd way like an unpractised puppeteer. It was unusual and was definitely not a natural default in the order of his anatomy. He felt almost protected, in a catastrophic kind of way in a way which he had never quite felt before.  
He generally upheld the impression that the mark caused more trouble than served as a solderic allie but his soft-spot for it was inscrutable. His was a critic of every love story and he saw himself lone but there was an element of no scrutiny that he could conjure and it drove him around the bend.

Sometimes it grew, and sometimes it multiplied. It would spread faster this way and would tend to happen on days his emotions possessed him like a rag doll and a needle. This day was unnaturally quiet and his mind had strayed to thoughts of Sirius, as often it did and what he would make of the untouched 1934 rum in the corner. Naturally, if he was still there, he could have drowned himself and Remus in the stuff by now, dragging Lupin tooth and claw into 'loosening up', stuffing him like a turkey with drunken compliments and showering him with confetti shaped like moons. He moved in his seat, dizzy with the kindness and innocence of the memory. Boredom often left young Sirius Black astray and once he had taken to cutting crescent shapes out of parchment designed to be niggity and a damn bloody awful shower to get rid of. The moons were shaped in scientifically wrong angles but his heart had been in the right place and it was all that Remus had ever really lived for in between the antics of his friends.

Remus was feeling severely calm and the mug carrying swirling tea to his lips and he felt himself warm immediately, a tingle settling into his limbs. At this time of year it became increasingly harder to implement 'No, I'm fine. No, I really. I do insist.' to matters such as the full force of the Weasleys clean from a full term at Hogwarts and good old Nymphadora was becoming more menacing as time went on. She'd bought a cage full of pixies to inhabit the Christmas tree situated in the sitting room, much to his dismay and anxiety. He was a modest man, and he tended to decorate pines pretty traditionally with what he could scrape up, as James and Sirius would say, it was his uptight, stuffy way and there was no point trying to change him and his abnormally large Rudolph nose. It was extraordinarily rich red at winter, that was true, they rubbed that in often but was always in jest and complimented him affectionately.

So, he had taken to the pine on a small step-ladder and grappled with the living tinsel a few nights before, hooking ball-balls and springs of holly with equal distance apart and as if, on cue, pixies swarmed out from underneath the needles and draped tinsel around him and tickled him, and pulled on his ears and bleated Christmas jokes into his ear. They were on command by check-list Nymphadora had devised to make him crack a smile. They were...they were relentless and he gave in more suddenly than he would have liked and it set off a puff and a flash from a positioned camera he had failed to catch his eye which captured the moment in its glory. Needless to say, that photograph now stood on the mantel piece in a hand-made frame, true Rita-Skeeta style, clearly Tonks had taken some notes and every time he entered the room he was greeted by a sultry, loose on the bones, quite unhealthy but strangely chipper man dipped in a twisted smile that did not show his confusion quite as strongly as he had felt it and did nothing to amplify how photogenic he was not blessed with.

He could now hear the faint sound of snow stirring outside when he was lucky enough to notice movement on the moving map in front of him. 'The one' had become less rowdy but now it was being joined by a similarly-sized mark pulsating as if some sort of communication. That was the wrong word. More like a mutual understanding, a wavelength he couldn't tune into. He leaned in and they twitched as if they knew, and flopped around as if laughing at how close his face was. Becoming quite self conscious, he kept his eyes fixed on them but his eyebrow raised in query. 'The one' banded into it's own space and began to move in close to circular movements now that it had his attention, or didn't, as it were because it couldn't. It was not possible. All the map was, was like an x-ray, there was no two-way communication. For some bizarre reason he felt that was on close terms with this dot, and what it was spelling out seemed desperately familiar but his brain was reluctant to piece it together. Was it- was that moon shapes it was making-  
There was a loud knock on the cottage door.


	4. Chapter 4

Wobbling, not used to standing he managed to hold himself up as if he was 50 years more his senior and he joined Nympadora who was wrapped in something resembling owl skin. With a squint, the outside world formed in front of him and he stepped out to view the carol singers who formed around the village, clenching onto their carols as if they were students and like Mcgonagall had threatened house point deduction if they didn't stand straight, wearing traditional hats and casting their patronuses as they sang. It was an inspiring gesture. He wrapped his woollen scarf and it itched his mouth and his nose as he used it to cover them. It was a beautiful sight to see, so many articulate and controlled patronuses brightening the sky around them. There was no fear or crack in their voices. He was a witness to a very significant event in his eyes, and he regarded the animals as they patted along the snow or wisped, wearing bows or bloated by Christmas pudding. A dolphin, a house cat, a fish, a badger, a giraffe...now he hadn't seen one of those in a long time.

Fascinated, he approached it and he stood in front of the young girl who it belonged to. Her cheeks were red as he watched her, and she was a wearing dark green scarf that engulfed her neck and gloves, too large for her hanging over the song sheets, her mouth wide and full of expression. He stood back, allowing her room and he let the atmosphere carry him away, listening to the men to the right of the pack, clearly fifth years, it was a teacher's initiative intentionally bellowed swapped lyrics to mild obscenities and throwing sparks upwards from their wands. Typical boys, as natural as a spring morning in July, and they made him hunch up with the mind's eye's flashbacks, recollecting the many Christmases he had spent with Padfoot, Prongs and Wormtail. They were just the same, just as insolent but he longed to stand with them now and hear their laughter flood him and comment on every trick in the book, and assigning each other to each young wizard in the crowd 'Just if they get out of hand'...'Because you know, because we're such responsible adults and that." "It's our almighty duty. We're prime example of wizard etiquette in this modern age." Remus would splutter showing his disagreement and James would rise to the challenge. "Sirius and I are training to be aurors after all." "Yes, Remus, aurors. Not that you would know anything about that, leaving all the gritty work to us as you make love to flea-ridden books."

"You'd know all about being flea-ridden, now, wouldn't you, Sirius my dear friend?" he would speak, slowly, like melting toffee that ruffled padfoot's fur so much.

He came out of the memory, breathing in the night air, and the distinct smell of chocolate floating past him. Dark was it, perhaps milk? certainly not white. He'd have to brush up on his flavours. He had plenty of time for that...oh, so plenty of time. He cast his attention to the side that he had broken off from his vision and he saw Nymphadora had joined them, the owl skin like a duvet wrapped around her had joined the end of the crowds and she was singing louder than the rest of them combined. She had a set of lungs on her, and it was pleasing to see her so in her element, surrounded by like-minded and electrifying people. People there were not him. Her hair was the only thing off-putting about this scene. Her hair was remarkably dire for her standard and she had adopted a dark brown almost black complexion.

It reminded him too much of Sirius. Far, far too much like Sirius. His ribcage pained him and he looked on in despair, shackling at how much he missed Sirius' hair. His hands running through it, Remus' hands running through it, anybody's bloody hands running it through it as long as it was having fingers run through it. From first year to his death his hair had undergone almost no changes, and he was a certain a brush had never come anywhere near it. It was that hair that had been the optimistic constant in his life, and through all his bodily changes, it was the one thing that never developed, unlike Sirius' ever-rising ego and saunter.

He hoped that Tonks would have it in her heart to change it. She was usually fickle with her fashion, and he would be glad for the moment that her hair turned purple again. Sitting in the base of his heart was something bitter and he couldn't look at the commotion marching around him as dearly as he once did a few seconds before. His body heavy he turned back to the cottage and walked into Molly Weasley.  
"Remus." she pruned. "Oh really. When was the last time you brushed your hair-"  
What- hair- Sirius...  
"Remus are you listening to me?"  
Pulling himself out from disconnection his eyes settled on the flowered pinny and layers of material, and swarm of ginger hair. It should be red - why on earth did it fall short -  
"Yes..." his stomach turned and he suddenly felt gravely under the weather. "Molly, it's wonderful to see you."  
He moved a glance to what she was holding, his suitcase, it seemed.  
"Oh. I see. I-not today, some other day, maybe."  
"I won't take no for an answer Remus, honey. You've avoided me enough, don't think I don't notice. You're as bad as poor Ronald."  
"It must be something to do with our shared letter R, hm." he explained, stupidly, his eyes crinkling.  
Molly Weasley looked at him as if he hadn't taken medication in an extremely long time and his head had turned into that of Severus Snape.  
"I suppose I have no objection in this matter?"  
"I wouldn't count your hopes too high."  
"Well then. Give me a moment then lovely Molly, allow me to collect some of my things."

He reached the basement and he sighed, feeling the hinge squeak and catch underneath him, a sensation he wouldn't feel until at least new year's day. His imprisonment was likely to be a sentence of three weeks. He felt very old.

Now to the tricky opposition of the map. The table had served him as being useful, being just the right size to access it cleanly. Now it would have to be folded and would take an hour expedition just to find 'the one.' It messed things up considerably, as he feared the creases would cause harm to allow those involved. He lifted it and he eased it into the leather case for a boggart. He made it easier on himself using an extension charm. He always had to be on alert around Molly. She left well enough alone and she was a treasure when it came to limits but making his privacy undetectable was a habit.

His heart felt emptied at the sight of the plain table. It was on going on in his heart but now that he could not see it in front of him, the ways of the heart felt just unpursueable and difficult to keep up with.

He unearthed the original marauders map that used its power of persuasion to hook onto his trip and he handled it with precision and care, as if he was carrying them all. Sirius never used to treat it with such precision. Remus recalled a time where Sirius had ground it down into a soup and made sure it came into Snape's vision and went his way. Snape threw up that night and the map returned covered in chicken and herbs beside Sirius' bedside. James treated it with similar regard and all too often he found it hanging on the washing line, pinned up with two pegs, flapping in the breeze, next to Lily then Evan's knickers.

The memories giving him the amount of ignition he needed, he pushed himself upwards by the balls of his feet and he walked up the narrow stairs to meet Molly, Nymphadora and Arthur who had now joined them holding a generous amount of floo powder.


	5. Chapter 5

Ginny Weasley was gawking at Remus, he could see her just above the paper he was holding. Being at the burrow tended to rub off on him and he couldn't help but sport a knowledgeable glint in his eye and he tilted his face noticing that she was spyng at him.

"Professor, I-"

There above Ginny's lightly combed hair was the enchanted clock he had seen often, but not quite in the same way. It was rude of him to break contact although the whole family knew him to be pensive. He put the newspaper down and he leaned forward, entwining his hands and resting them on the table.

"I know it's silly but is that blood on your shirt?"

Molly, never missing a single trick, sprang her head up from the washing. "Ginny dear, it's probably from a rough full moon, isn't it Remus? Don't bother him, so."

Remus spun an instinctive sickly smile of reprouch and appreciation for Molly's quick save. He moved his eye downwards. He found the blood waiting for him that he didn't expect. It was the colour of Molly's beetroot red jelly she served last night.

"I believe it's mine." he rose up, suddenly, grappling for the wall behind him, tumbling out of the chair despite there being no pain.

He raised his finger to make his emotions clear to Molly. "No fuss, no fuss!"

Stabling himself, he regarded the clock. He could hear a particularly nasty batch of gnomes clawing at the back door and paper party hats falling from the top of the winding stairs which impeccably reminded him of Grimmwauld place.

Remus rolled the area of his temples and he groaned matter-of-factedly as if there had simply been a mishap in the cirumstance. There, on the clock was a spoon that held the face of Sirius black, as he had been out of Askaban, dressed in velvet yet he always let it known that he'd prefer to adopt a few pieces from Remus' wardrobe.

It winked.

Remus felt as if he was rolling in his grave and he wasn't even the one whom was dead.

Sirius raised his hand which he had used to do and clearly still could quieten the rage that came onto his heart. He would always subconciously move with it, as a puppet to his will. In that moment it was true and he was real, magic was rarely wrong but knowing his luck this would be the one exception. He walked towards the wall and to the two weasleys accompanying him, it would have looked like he was heading straight for the wall. In some ways, they'd be right. He's certainly hit a brick wall. He perched his neck. Curious.

Mrs Weasley spoke up, clearly distressed by the intensity she was clenching onto a rolling pin. "We were going to tell you. Of course I opposed but once Arthur has made up his mind not even the-"

Remus raised his finger to his lips. He slowly reached out and his dirtied finger touched the metal spoon and Sirius' lips tousled. Moony meets Padfoot, time after time again and Remus felt as if he was tainting him, and Sirius was always thinking the very same thing. He read the label again 'Still with us.'

"In more ways than one." he stated, gently, bringing himself away from the wall, the wrinkles in his forehead that worked their way in whenever he was confronted with a problem craning. "If you don't mind, I'm going to be retreating to my bedroom tonight."

It was painstaking to study the map in a state of mind such as the one he was in. He had locked and bolted the bedroom door and cast every intricate muffling charm over the room so he would not be disturbed. Turning over his large coat in his hand and draping it over the hat stand, he had opened the buttons of his shirt to inspect the cause for the blood. It had come from the heart, quite suddenly as you would have it, sleek and unnoticeable, quite the performance. He wasn't any closer to identifying it, but he found it slightly inticing that way. Knowing almost everything had never been a curse, but it was a nice change to have something challenge his intelligence. It was good to have a substitute for the brain damage Sirius tried to supernaturally evoke. In other words, be so much of an idiot that Remus simply 'couldn't take it any more and converted into one of the real boys.'

Remus walked to the window and he peered down at the midnight quidditch match that had unleashed using make-shift bludgers he had supplied them with and a tomato from the tomato bush as a larger-than-life snitch. He didn't find it safe for them to be out there, or maybe that was just the instinct talking to him. The floorboards creaked below him as he took up the smaller map into his hands. He opened it just enough so he wasn't snooping but enough to comfort himself silly with the normality of the grounds of Hogwarts.

As incredulous as it might seem, he had never adapted quite to one place quite so fast. Under the wing of Sirius Black and James Potter, there was rarely any apprehension worth fighting for, not that they could stifle his level mind and prefect-born tendancies to keep them grounded. Every day with them was a voyage in the dark but he had always known he was as much as a fever fudge receipe as they were. His heart belonged to the hallow, lit walls of Hogwarts and it was a nervous tick opening the map to absorb himself within, like a tissue to the nose or a wet cloth along the head.

Remus watched on silently as a tomato collided with Ron's head much to the disappointment of Fred and George wearing santa claus hats. "Who is this santa claus folk anyway?" "I don't know, Fred. Sounds like a pervert to me." "I know, George." covered in crumbs of pumpkin pastries and joking about how if you're going to implant a humongous beard for a cultural image, at least make it longer than Dumbledore's beard. Even the gnombs were decorated in fairy lights, walking around gruffly, sulking, Remus would say he had never seen the like but growing up with James, Sirius and Peter he couldn't tell a larger lie. Ice coated the trees and he came out into the brisk air, his thin hair glowing in the wind, as if the spirit of Sirius was making its way through it and commenting on how he needed to move into the 21st Century.

His pockets were lined with boiled sweets and he moved them between his fingers as he watched the whole family get involved down the bottom of the garden, he was standing on something that had once was meant to resemble a patio. He shared a couple of crackers with them, once or twice actually winning a toy or two. It was beside himself the inability not to smile warmly and hold the metal whistle that tooting itself in the palm of his hand like was a precious jewel clean out of the vaults. "You're supposed to blow it, silly." "I'm not quite there, as it were. I'd prefer to let it play on its own than interfere."

The third cracker he had been gifted enough to be involved with, he stopped almost head-on. There, in the mist of the smoke and streams lay a minature hound-like creature.

Harry looked over, his glasses askew in the ways James once did. "Well, what is it, Remus?"

Remus looked taken aback, as if he was just being questioned on whereabouts of an argentian troll resembling the physiche of you-know-who and startled, he mumbled, his voice dimming. "Not unlike a Grimm." he looked into the air, as if he was addressing an informal joke. He felt like something paused over his heart. "Oh, Padfoot, you'd think that you were stalking me."

He worked much harder after that, the small plastic being his main string of motivation. A member of his Defence Again The Dark Arts class came to join the festivities. Long since after the night he had found a sign from Sirius in a cracker, he had taken to doing some more obscure things like helping Molly with the cooking. The Burrow kitchen smelled of madam puddifoot's tea shop and honeydukes sweets and dinstinct traces of gun powder which made Remus' nose wriggle and his eyes glint knowingly at pranks performed there. Bent over a bird in the cooker, he wore oven cloves and politely declined an apron. He was sooted with a different substance entirely rather than the dirt, dust and exhaustion he usually carried.

He hadn't seen someone look so much in disdain since Sirius discovered in a muggle book waiting for him in the library that his chinese zodiac sign was a wolf. He almost had a stroke that day, and he was irrepressable afterwards. Neville Longbottom and his grandmother were shacking up for christmas eve. Young Longbottom was wearing an expression of mortification that was much too old for a young man like himself, much too much on his plate worth contemplating about. He reminded him very much of Peter. He thought deeply of Peter, despite what good it did to him linger on it.

Remus couldn't help but eye him warily with a tremor of suspicious regard as Neville walked nervously into the kitchen. Could he spy what he couldn't before? had he been too kind to see signs earlier that Peter's resentment

Looking upon him with dismay, he felt absent-minded hands comfort his heart. It was a soothing touch that told him get a grip.

Realising his his rudeness, Remus withdrew his calculating stare. There was no need to be passive agressive, especially to a boy who clearly wasn't a reincarnation of Peter in the very least.

Neville held a three hundred and sixty degree curl of glass. A remembral, he remembered vaguely. James had had one at some time or other point in time. It had served many pranks, but one thing that always made his smile lift was how he had been unable to prank the remembral from it's deep red sign of stupidity. It had been, however, lobbed over the Hogwarts grounds to which one day Dumbledore had approached them carrying in two hands in front of him. Sirius laughter was a key reminder in this memory.

Remus rubbed the nape of his neck, one of the few places where a scar had not touched him but did not hesitate to replace with tension that he kneaded out gently, his wand in his pocket and his shoulders slumped as he gripped behind him on the surface. He didn't know if inspection had left him long enough to identify it, but he had seen a tiny gleam of red. He had forgotten something.

The occurance seemed to glide away from him and his bones were tight and rigid in need of a massage at the sight of the battlefield that awaited him and had been happening outside the kitchen door. He gingerly walked through the writhing tinsle and the animated snowmen that lunged pieces of themselves at him and attacked easter music. Amused, he looked at the bowl alone on a table filled with bright red boil sweets.

He saw that there was a light or two hovering from a room over head. Spending a personal lifetime with James and Sirius, he had learned that it could be account for many things. Students up late after bed, that one was popular. He couldn't but help but embrace the niggle in his chest in a oddly muggle fashion that they were spirits.

He walked closer, his head raised and he peered through door and wall into the slit open. It was a foolish wizard's preoggative to suspect to be something entirely different to how it would appear. It was a light, not a form, the rest was self-explanatory but his mind had always been known to wander in the more hopeful and romanticised view.


End file.
